October 2012

F&I Insider Quarterly Newsletter

Inside this issue

Page Story

1 Protect the Sale

1 IRS Form 8300

2 P1 Anniversary Contest Dealer Winners

3 Upcoming Events

4 Forest River Credit Card Moves into

Marine

F&I Tip

While it’s only

necessary to use one credit bureau, it is to your advantage to

have access to reports from the top three

credit bureaus:

Equifax, Experian and

TransUnion, because

scores and credit information can differ

greatly between the three. Priority One works with all three

bureaus in order

to maximize the

opportunity for

approvals.

Protect the Sale 4 Outside Risks

In the last newsletter, we explained how to

protect your dealership from liability through ensuring lien perfection, requiring genuine customer signatures and witnessing contract

signing. In this newsletter we want to explain how to protect your sale during customer financing.

The easiest way to protect the sale of the unit is by offering all of your customers the option to finance through your dealership. Typically, up to 70% of recreational purchases across the United

States are financed through either a local bank, credit union or even a home equity loan. If your

dealership delivers ten units a month, seven of those are going to be

financed somewhere. It might as well be through your dealership.

Today, most customers already have some idea of how they’re going to pay

for their purchase. After you ask them how, and their answer is “by check,” find out if the check is from a bank or other lending facility, rather than a personal check. This is important because you’ve spent days, weeks and even months to get the customer to commit to the purchase and you don’t

want to lose the sale due to outside influences.

(continued on page 3)

F&I Legal Compliance: IRS Form 8300

At the recent RVDA convention in Las Vegas, Jared Zimlin, Business Development Director of Priority One, presented a workshop on

F&I compliance regulations required by your

dealership, F&I Legal Compliance: Hidden

Liabilities in your F&I Department. One of the topics was the IRS Form 8300, which is a form used for cash transactions over

$10,000 received either as a single transaction or a series of related

transactions.

(continued on page 2)

Congratulations

Heather Mariscal!

Heather Mariscal, president of Priority One,

was honored as one of the finalists for the

Tampa Bay Business Journal’s 2012 Business

Woman of the Year awards.

Nine other fellow P1’ers

joined in the black tie dinner gala held in

August.

Veritas Insurance Website Makeover

Page 2

Congratulations

to our Monthly Dealer Winners!

July winner:

MacDonald’s RV Center

Prize:

Foosball Table

August winner:

Keeper’s RV

Prize:

Apple iPad 16GB

September winner:

Lauderdale Lakes Marina

Prize:

Cruisinart Coffee Maker

Next quarter you could win:

October:

iRobot-Roomba Bagless Robotic Vacuum Cleaner

November:

Breville Panini Press

December:

32” LCD HDTV

Your dealership or any business

accepting that amount of cash, must file Form 8300 within 15

days after the date the cash was received. Also each time the

payments aggregate in excess of $10,000, another Form 8300 must

be filed within 15 days of the

payment.

Civil penalties include up to $25,000 for intentional disregard of the filing requirements.

Criminal penalties include up to five years in jail and/or fines up to

$250,000 for individuals. For

corporations, up to $500,000 may

apply in the case of willful filing of false or fraudulent forms.

To learn more you can go to:

http://www.irs.gov/Businesses/Small-Businesses-&-Self-Employed/Form-8300-

and-Reporting-Cash-Payments-of-Over-$10,000.com

IRS Form 8300 Veritas Insurance, our

insurance partner,

received a face lift in

August when their

website was redesigned to

reflect that Veritas is an industry leader in

providing specialized insurance on all

recreational products. The new site uses the

existing domain name of

www.veritasinsurance.com.Please check it out.

Like us on Facebook.

There are many ways letting your

customer seek financing outside your dealership can jeopardize your sale.

1. Bank Declines Loan The customer assumes his personal

bank will give him a loan but, as it

turns out, the bank declines the loan and the customer thinks he

can’t pay for the unit. The customer, rather than tell you his financing has been declined by his bank, tells you he changed his mind

or simply disappears.

2. Loan Terms are Insufficient

Sales can be lost by customers not getting the terms they want. Sometimes the lender’s program is limited. Instead of suggesting they

visit another lender (competitor) that might have a longer term or lesser interest rate, they lead the

customer to believe your dealership is selling the unit for too much money.

3. Insurance Quote is Too High Customers never want to look cheap, so again, they tend to just

say they’ve changed their mind or it’s not a good time for them to move forward.

Protect the Sale (continued from page 1)

Page 3

Upcoming Events

There are still two

tradeshows Priority One will be exhibiting at this fall. Please stop by and say “hello” if you find

yourself at the shows.

MDCE Nov. 11-14, 2012

Location: Orange County Convention Center,

Orlando, FL

Booth #200

RVIA Trade Show

Nov. 27-29, 2012

Location: Kentucky Expo. Center, Louisville, KY

Booth #17

Priority One Sponsors Team for Savage Race

On Oct 20th, several

Priority One employees competed against other

teams in Savage Race, a 5 mile mud/obstacle race.

We’re happy to report everyone survived and

plan on participating next year.

4. Kickbacks The customer’s banker has a dealer friend and gets a kickback from

referring customers. Seriously, this happens all the time!

In all of the above scenarios, train your sales staff to probe for the

correct information. Point out that your dealership has great financing

options through Priority One who works with multiple lenders and can offer very competitive programs.

The goal here is to get the customer interested enough to complete a credit application. Remind your

customers that completing an application does not obligate them to anything, is easy and an answer could be available same day.

Selling is hard enough, but when

you throw in outside influences working against your dealership it can be downright scary. A sales staff that offers financing to every

customer is the best protection you have against outside influences and helping to ensure a successful sale.

Please call Lorraine Mariotti, Vice President of Lending, at

800-747-6223, if you have any

questions on this article.

BonusBucks Update

Since the inception (six months ago) of our rewards program, for

marine dealers, hundreds of

dealers have received BonusBucks.

If you haven’t heard

about this program, please call your

business manager for details.

The Forest River Credit Card Moves into Marine

Phone: 800-747-6223 Fax: 800-341-6223 E-mail: newsletter@p1fs.com

PRIORITY ONE

We’re on the web:

www.p1fs.com

F&I Insider

742 Second Avenue South

Saint Petersburg, FL 33701

To view archived F&I Insider newsletters, please check out the News section of our website: www.p1fs.com.

The Forest River Credit Card, which

initially offered special financing options on towable products,

services, parts and accessories, is now available for Forest River marine dealers. Card members can now take advantage of multiple financing

options on boat engines, parts, service and winterization.

For additional information, call Greg

Hauenstein, program representative, at 800-419-1041 ext. 263.

Winter Hours:

Our winter Saturday hours

for the months of Nov. and Dec. will be 10-4 EST.

There should be no impact

to you, but in the event of a spot/late delivery, we will make sure you are taken care of and there to serve you.

Regular Saturday hours

of 10-6 EST will resume in January.